From trust to tragedy : the political memoirs of Frederick Nolting, Kennedy's ambassador to Diem's Vietnam
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Bibliographic Information
From trust to tragedy : the political memoirs of Frederick Nolting, Kennedy's ambassador to Diem's Vietnam
Praeger, 1988
- : pbk
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Note
Bibliography: p. [149]-153
Includes index
Description and Table of Contents
- Volume
-
ISBN 9780275930806
Description
When he was appointed ambassador to South Vietnam by President Kennedy, Frederick Nolting remembers a friend warning him that Vietnam puts a blight on everyone who touches it--a blight of frustration, futility, and failure. Twenty-seven years later, he observes candidly that ironies, frustrations, reversals, and failures abound in the records of many Americans who have touched Vietnam, including his own. From Trust to Tragedy is Frederick Nolting's frank and perceptive account of the events in Vietnam and Washington that culminated in the overthrow of the Diem government in November 1963. It is the story of how the situation appeared to him as he worked to help Vietnam achieve peace and freedom and why he still believes that by encouraging the military revolt against Diem, the Kennedy administration set the stage for the tragic war that followed. Although Nolting's account is, by his own description, not a history but an interpretation, he has checked his vivid recollections against official documents and the interpretations of others so that they blend with the broader fabric of the history of the Vietnam War. He pulls no punches in his evaluations of some of the towering figures of the Kennedy administration against whom he had to fight for his policies. As William E. Colby, the CIA station chief in Saigon notes in his foreword, In the end, he lost that battle, but his story of it is a necessary piece of American history.
Table of Contents
Background, 1946-1961 Assignment to Vietnam In Harness Negotiating the U.S. Role in Vietnam The Military Picture and Pacification The Laos Accords, the Comprehensive Plan, and Media Relations From Euphoria to Ferment The Buddhist Crisis Washington: Vacillation and Betrayal Bibliography Index
- Volume
-
: pbk ISBN 9780275931063
Description
When he was appointed ambassador to South Vietnam by President Kennedy, Frederick Nolting remembers a friend warning him that Vietnam puts a blight on everyone who touches it--a blight of frustration, futility, and failure. Twenty-seven years later, he observes candidly that ironies, frustrations, reversals, and failures abound in the records of many Americans who have touched Vietnam, including his own. From Trust to Tragedy is Frederick Nolting's frank and perceptive account of the events in Vietnam and Washington that culminated in the overthrow of the Diem government in November 1963. It is the story of how the situation appeared to him as he worked to help Vietnam achieve peace and freedom and why he still believes that by encouraging the military revolt against Diem, the Kennedy administration set the stage for the tragic war that followed. Although Nolting's account is, by his own description, not a history but an interpretation, he has checked his vivid recollections against official documents and the interpretations of others so that they blend with the broader fabric of the history of the Vietnam War. He pulls no punches in his evaluations of some of the towering figures of the Kennedy administration against whom he had to fight for his policies. As William E. Colby, the CIA station chief in Saigon notes in his foreword, In the end, he lost that battle, but his story of it is a necessary piece of American history.
Table of Contents
Background, 1946-1961
Assignment to Vietnam
In Harness
Negotiating the U.S. Role in Vietnam
The Military Picture and Pacification
The Laos Accords, the Comprehensive Plan, and Media Relations
From Euphoria to Ferment
The Buddhist Crisis
Washington: Vacillation and Betrayal
Bibliography
Index
by "Nielsen BookData"
